VA Emerson: McAuliffe +3

[Person Man]

I’m very confident that McAuliffe will win, not because he’s some god-tier candidate, but because Virginia is far gone enough for Republicans that a good environment isn’t going to be enough for them to win it.

Unless the Democratic Party is on the verge of collapse, they will win in Virginia because of the shenanigans in Texas. If Democrats can’t hold on to Virginia, 2022 is 2010-tier. It might be like 1894 where it convinces the current Democratic president not to run.

[Person Man]

Is McAuliffe really that popular?  He's a guy that didn't get 50% against Ken Cuccinelli.  Now I know that VA has moved at least a bit to the left since then, but his failure to get 50% in 2013 suggests he's not real popular on a personal level.

He's a safer candidate for the Democrats than some of the alternatives, but I don't see him as so popular to where a Republican in a Republican year couldn't beat him, however slightly.

Not sure how it's prudent to go back to his 2013 margin before he was actual governor for 4 years though. He was more of an unknown at that point.

He wasn't that unknown.  IIRC he attempted to get the nomination in 2009 but lost at a convention to Creigh Deeds.  The knock then was that he was a Northerner and a NOVA candidate who was close to the Clintons.

A lot has changed since then.  VA is a lean D state and a trending D state, but the Dems have been in power for 16 of the last 20 years.  McAuliffe benefits from some of to, but I don't see him as having the kind of PERSONAL popularity to counter a strong R trend..  Mark Warner almost lost in 2014.  McAuliffe has never gotten 48 percent of the VA vote.  We're going to see how much the VA landscape has changed long-term this year.

He's been in one election...

That doesn’t mean anything. Florida is a tilt R state and Republicans has been in power there 24 of the last 24 years. If you didn’t know the margins of the races when Obama was on the ballot, you would think Florida was as conservative as Wyoming.